Bewitched: Twilight Zone
by Thor2000
Summary: What if Samantha had married someone other than Darren with secrets of their own. This story features an alternate reality version to the series.
1. Chapter 1

Built around 1910, the Dolphin Hotel may not have been one of the most opulent hotels in New Your City, but it was known for having one of the most gracious and best services for wandering traveler or the accidental tourist. The lobby reminded a few of the aristocracy of Europe, but at a price that the typical regular man could afford. The employees were gracious unless you got Casey, one of the more opportunistic bellhops in the location. The structure had two hundred rooms and fifteen suites over twenty-five floors. Up on the twenty-third floor was the honeymoon suite, and a very beautiful woman sat at the vanity table in it brushing her locks. She might not have had the presence of Marilyn Monroe or the body of Jayne Mansfield, but she was indeed special… very special if one knew the secrets of her past and abilities. Endowed with the royalty of Grace Kelly and the mystique of Veronica Lake, the modest beauty brushed her hair waiting for her brand-new husband to return to her. Beyond her five senses, something was rushing to meet her, coming to visit her. She heard the thunder of the sky, the rumble of clouds and the harmony of mystical energies filling her ears within the room. Where once was an unobstructed view of the apartment building across the street was now a stern yet upset woman of raven red hair wearing long and flowing lavender and green robes as thin as silk.. Her face was white, her ruby red lips trapped in an angry pout and her round eyes with the obvious eyelashes narrowed into annoyed yet worried slits holding back her frustration.

"Mother!!!" The younger beauty sat at the vanity surprised by her arrival. "What are you doing here?!"

"What am I doing here?'" Mother glided lovingly to her daughter. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm married!" The shined proudly, but her smile slowly nervously shrank away at the disproving shake of the head of her mother.

"I know…" Mother responded quite annoyed and upset at her. "Let you out of my sight for one minute! Now…" She turned round to the window. "Now, hold on to me and we'll be home before you can say…"

"I'm not going!" The newlywed daughter resisted.

"I was afraid of that." Mother sighed a bit at that response. "He has you under a spell. Oh, those young male witches are the worst kind…"

"He's not a warlock, nor a wizard…." Daughter knew the secrets of their family and the history of their culture very well.

"What?" Her mother placed her hand to her chest very haughty; she was not prepared for this. Her left eyebrow went up practically repulsed into screaming in disgrace.

"He is…" The younger sorceress continued as she stood, brushing her hair a bit more and setting aside her brush a second before looking back upon her mother. "If you pardon the expression, a normal mortal human being…"

"Oh, well, that's even easier!" Mother deviously grinned and wiggled her fingers toward her daughter craftily. "I'll just turn him into a toad or something!"

"Mother, you'll leave him alone!" Daughter risked her mother's disapproving anger to defend her new husband. "He's a dear sweet perfectly wonderful person!"

"Oh, my poor baby…" Mother patted daughter over the head. "He sounds simply horrible, oh, but don't worry, darling. I'll get you out of here."

"I'm not going!" Daughter resisted, folded her arms before her chest and resisted her mother's strict up bringing.

"Really…" Mother was used to her daughter's little games. "How would you like to spend your night with a bullfrog?" She threatened. Her daughter whirled round to her upset then softened to try again out of love.

"Don't you understand?" She appealed to any compassion her mother had left. "I'm happy with him."

"Don't talk to your mother that way." Mother shook her finger to her daughter. "I'll let you know when you're happy." There was a noise in the outer apartment from the door opening and closing. The prodigal son-in-law was back from checking his messages. The young newlywed daughter felt her heart skip a beat. How was she going to explain her mother being here?!

"Uh-oh…" She tensed up lightly out of fearful concern "He's coming in!"

"I'll take care of that!" Her mother moved for the bedroom door.

"Take it easy now!"

"I'm not going to hurt him…" Her mother looked to her daughter and back to the door. Her mortal son-in-law had knocked lightly to announce his entrance and was slowly pushing the door open in his entrance. He had a brief view of the room past the bedroom door, walked forward a few steps and entered to greet his brand new wife, but as he strided forward, he stepped aside to miss the bellboy carrying luggage, the salesman with the travel case and the young lady on the sofa with the baby and the small suitcase. Looking again, he recognized the front desk to his left side and the hotel entrance to his right. How did the hotel lobby get up here? Maybe the question was, how did he get back down to the lobby?! He whirled round under the crystal chandelier hanging from the high Elizabethan ceiling and around the expensive décor that illuminated the atmosphere. His mind tried to shake itself alert, his jaw dropped lightly from confusion and he looked around the fully dressed people looking upon him in his robe and slippers as if he had just popped down from the heavens. He reacted confused and bewildered, his embarrassment turning to frustration. A mother with children tugged her children closer to her, a bellhop smirked a bit amused and an interested observer gazed upon him once then twice before gesturing with his cigarette.

"Submitted for your approval," The observer spoke to an unseen audience beyond his world. "Mr. James Donald Reason, but then that's not his real name, but we'll get to that in a few minutes. You see… this is not his story, but rather that of the attractive young beauty upstairs by the same of Samantha Elizabeth Spellcraft. Samantha as you might have discovered a bit different beyond her looks and feminine appeals. Lovely Samantha is a witch, a sorceress and practitioner of magic from a group of beings much older than the span of us normal mediocre beings, but she is about to discover beings and individuals much older… and much more powerful that even herself. For you see, this is an alternate reality to the sequence of events you think you are aware of so well. In this skewed reality, things have turned into another direction designed to carry her beyond the boundaries of that expanse of reason which we know as…. the Twilight Zone."


	2. Chapter 2

2

James Reason once more traveled the elevator up to the twenty-third floor noticed by a cute blonde teenager and two giggling twin boys. He mused toward them a second and wandered forward a bit determinedly to the honeymoon suite. His embarrassment was gone, his temper abated but his curiosity piqued as he sought answers to his experience. He entered the suite eagerly and analytically before he started hurling accusations to his own family members. He'd only had a sip of wine as he had talked on the phone. He was not inebriated. At the tip of the bottle, he stood at the bar and sniffed it before setting it back aside. There was a reason for everything, and everything had a reason. Out the corner of his eye, he detected a presence of a woman in a white dress, but it was not his blushing bride. She was a bit more petite with long flowing blond hair, a wide beaming grin and a long white gown adorned with pieces of jewelry of silver and gold.

"My baby boy is married again!" She shined and bounced in that long white dress. "I told you after your last wife you'd marry again, and what? It only took you fifty years to get over the last one."

"Forty-seven and a half…" James closed the doors to the suite. "Why did you just zap me down to the lobby in my robe." His mother looked at him and furrowed her perfect face into a face of confusion.

"That wasn't me, and besides, mother doesn't zap, she gestures!" She waved her hand as a display of her godly powers. She was not a fan of modern colloquiums. She darted her head back lovingly eccentric and grinning widely to her last son of many over the centuries. "Now, you must bring her to the next family dinner! Your father is bringing your new half-sister all the way from Asgard. I'm so curious to see if she takes after his side of the family. That's sort of what attracted me that big blonde thunder god, his big horned helmet and goatskin cape…."

"Mom…." William groaned and gently protested. "I can't bring her to any dinners yet. She's not an Immortal."

"Well, that's not a problem!" The former love-goddess glided and sashayed through the room. "We got used to the others. I mean, your Uncle Apollo is always bringing another female conquest, and you know how…"

"Mom…" William winced at his mother's highly distracted emotions. "I already got her used to the idea of a dysfunctional family. I have to wait before I expose her to the fact that you and the family were once worshipped as gods by the Romans…"

"And the Greeks, the Dacians, the Etruscans, the Mysians, the Basques, the Phoenicians, the Minoans, the Achaeans, the Ionians, and the Lycians among others." His mother curiously pondered the remote to the TV and considered showing it off to a certain smith-god as a novelty item. "Don't forget I was worshipped by not just one culture but two! Those Sumerians had not just one name for me, but dozens! I still recall their barbecues…. Your grandfather on the other hand…."

"Mom, please…" William took her dainty hands to get her attention. "Let me handle how I'll introduce Samantha to the family. She's not used to magic or immortality."

"She will, baby…" She kissed her grown son daintily to the cheek. "By the way, stop fighting with your sisters. You know they take after me."

"And whose fault is that!" He looked again and noticed his mother had teleported between points on the planet again. He had lived too much of his life abroad with his great-grandmother. Rhea had raised him to be sympathetic to all living things while his father had wanted him to be a warrior, but there was not much call to slay dragons in the Twentieth Century when they hid in Scottish lakes or the depths of the oceans. Remembering his wedding vows, he recalled he had a wife again… the fifth in his two hundred years of immortal existence. He knocked at his bedroom door once more and looked ahead this time. Standing over by the window looking out, Samantha suddenly reacted to his presence and turned to him out of love. A breeze lightly stirred her gown and wrap, reminding him that she was just as beautiful as some of the goddesses he used to romance.

"I can't believe just how incredible you really are." He fell in love with her image.

"Jimmy, honey…" She glided over to him. "There is something I must tell you."

"Look, there's something I must tell you too." He sat down in the love seat with her.

"I got to go first…"

"Mine's more important…"

"If I don't tell you now, I never will…"

"I should have told you before the wedding, but…"

"Jimmy, please," Samantha took his hands in her lap. "I have to tell you this…"

"Samantha," He caressed her cheek lovingly. "Whatever it is, I will always love you, but…" He stared into her big blue eyes. "You might not love me if you hear what I got to say."

"What?!" She reacted with suspicious tension. "Oh my stars, you're a warlock, aren't you?"

"A what?" He looked at her confused. What did she call him? "A war… no. No, that's not it. You see, Samantha… Uh…" He stood struggling with this confession, looked at her again looking at him with such love and devotion and recalled Allison, his previous wife and how he had told her. "Do you recall your world mythology?"

"What?" Samantha looked around a bit confused. "Well, of course… My Aunt Enchantra told me all about them. Zeus, Hercules, Ares, Aphrodite…"

"Yeah, but not just them, but Thor, Odin, Balder and the others like Osiris, Ammon-Ra…." He cut to the chase. "Would you like to meet them?"

"What?" She felt she hadn't heard him right.

"Samantha…" James sat by her again and took her hands in his. "They're your in-laws now."

"What?!!!" At this point, she didn't believe him.

"Samantha…." James stroked her face lovingly again. "By the standards of the modern calendar, I was born on May 15, 1569. My real name is Jason Donner Odinson and my parents are Thor and Aphrodite. The Thor and Aphrodite!!!"

"The Thor and Aphrodite…." Samantha repeated almost in a trance. Right now, her confession didn't mean much. Her face was filled with confusion, disbelief and stunned surprise.

"If it means much…" James held her hands in his. "You're taking this much better than my third wife." He watched her taking the bottle of champagne from the table before her and pouring it into a glass.

"Third wife?"

"She passed away before the Civil War." He watched Samantha down the champagne in one swallow then pour another one. "My last wife passed away after we arrived in the States." Samantha had downed another glass of the champagne. "We had booked passage on the Titanic, but…" He watched Samantha pour more from the bottle. "It didn't make the return trip, and…. Maybe you should go light on that stuff."

"It doesn't affect me." Samantha gasped a bit, caught her breath and lightly shined toward him. "You win… your news topped mine!"

"Samantha," He looked toward her. "What did you want to tell me?"

"Wait a second…." The blonde beauty wandered toward the windows, posed trying to think then turned back toward him. "You… you're a god."

"No."

"No?"

"One has to be worshipped to be a god…" He rose, strided over to her in love with her and held her by her hips. "I was born centuries after paganism ended. Technically, as a race we refer to ourselves as Immortals, even those of us still with worshippers… like the Native American deities or the gods of the East." He gazed into her eyes. "Samantha, what did you want to tell me?"

"You… you… you…." She was still trying to think straight as she wandered around him. "You're immortal? How could I not known this? I mean, me? How could you keep this from me?"

"Sam," James looked into her eyes. "I tried to tell you several, several times, but…" He sighed deeply. "You seemed to like the simple life we had. I liked it too. Several of my last relationships were failures because they were more interested in what they could get out of me. One girl even wanted me to make her immortal…" He caressed the side of her face tenderly. "Sam, you wanted to tell me something. What was it?"

"What was it?" It was now Samantha's turn to become defensive. "Uh, well, James, " She lit up with a big smile. "I'm… You're really not going to believe this…."

"What is it?" He kissed her with a big grin across his face.

"Well…" She looked at him again. "I'm a witch."

That grin just sort of froze on his face. She could tell his mind was absorbing the idea.

"You're a witch and you couldn't tell I was an Immortal?" He accepted her revelation much more easily than she had accepted his. After all, he had known quite a few witches, sorcerers and wizards. Most of them were quite reputable. The mortal witches he knew were nowhere as adept in their magic as the ones with certain longevity – it was those kinds who incorrectly called themselves immortal.

"I really didn't consider it." Samantha confessed. "Jimmy, it doesn't affect you wanting to be married to me, does it?"

"No, course not…" He gazed deeply and intently upon her. "As long as it doesn't bother you if I live in an apartment off Park Avenue instead of a drafty mountaintop valley with ancient porticos, does it?"

"No…" Their lips met and closed over each other in love. James inhaled her perfume and lightly pulled her close to him, her arms moving up over his back.

"Wait till I tell my mother…." They suddenly chorused together


	3. Chapter 3

3

Their honeymoon was spent lovingly teasing and falling in love with each other. What began in a New York City apartment jumped the Atlantic for shopping in London, lunch in Paris and a tour of James's old haunts in Europe from Northern Germany to the Greek isles. Over centuries, many of his favorite locales had been lost to wars and progress. Modern dams rerouted rivers and flooded areas where he'd once lived, submerging ancient Germanic villages. Nazi armies had removed from existence towns Samantha once knew as a child. In Greece, James knew the real location of the Labyrinth, the route Theseus took to Thebes and the lost palaces of Agamemnon and Odysseus. Along the way, she asked him about lost secrets even her family was unaware of.

"What ever happened to the Golden Fleece?" She asked him as he drove his Lincoln convertible to the family estate. They could have mystically transported to the locale, but it was far more normal and less than disconcerting to people unaware of magic to arrive by mortal means.

"It was buried with the bones of Phrixus in Iolcus."

"The head of Medusa?"

"Bronzed into a weapon by my Aunt Athena."

"Pegasus?"

"Still alive…" James was watching for the crossroads to the family's American estate. "She's kept in the stables on the estate in Greece."

"Instead of on Mount Olympus?"

"I've never even been to Mount Olympus…" Jason answered. "My grandfather began relocating the foundations after mortals started mapping the world. He's moved them around half a dozen times since. He doesn't like the idea of some mountain climber suddenly appearing uninvited, but he does own property near the Mount Olympus in Washington."

"Where are they now?"

"Here…" Jason drove through the gates of Olympia Estate near New Thebes, Connecticut. In the distance obscured by trees, many of them hundred of years old, was a large mansion of mortal design, but incorporated into it was the Dorian columns, the Greek fountains and statuary and Mycenaean trademarks of Ancient Greece. It was like being on the Acropolis. Blocked from view by the trees were transplanted Greek halls connected by concrete paths linked to the main house by torches burning in the night air. A distant centaur lifted his head to their arrival and plodded out of view amongst several faeries flitting through the driveway and into the woods in the form of balls of light. The circular driveway was aligned with Grecian pillars covered in long-growing vines and in the woods of the vast estate were the signs of Ancient Greek temples lit by burning pyres. James parked near his Uncles Hermes' sports car and his Uncle Hades' hearse. On Earth, the former god of the dead procured errant souls in the form of an occult researcher. Who didn't arrive in Hades' realm willingly was usually yanked unwillingly from a haunted house on Earth.

"Looks like Uncle Hades is here." James answered casually.

"Uncle Hades?" Samantha appeared in a long dark blue dress with a white wrap. "Should I be worried?"

"No…" James guided her by the waist. "But don't talk to him unless he talks to you first. He's gets a bit melancholy… sort of like Edgar Allen Poe as a mortician…"

"Anyone I should be worried about?" Samantha glided from the courtyard past flowerbeds of every flower and bulb possible and up a tour of laid steps from an elaborate veranda of stone and concrete. From the drive and past fountains and wide walkways, she ascended to this modern version of Olympus, guarded by two high oak doors carved by masterful artisans. James pounded the doors once to announce his arrival and looked to Samantha lovingly as one of the mortal servants opened the door. As far as this young lady knew, she served a wealthy and eccentric family without any knowledge of their identities.

"No, course not…" James looked to her. "Grandfather loves mortals, especially the ones who know magic. He thinks they're hysterical. Uncle Ares can be nasty, but he's become much more tolerant considering all the times he's been stripped of his godhood."

"Gee, I wonder why…." Samantha entered into an incredible hall with a black and white parquet floor and decidedly Greek furnishings. The grand staircase seemed supported and crafted from marble. The walls were decorated in incredible paintings dating from the Renaissance and tapestries from Medieval Europe. The décor could have come from a museum. There were vases depicting events from Greek legend: the slaying of the Gorgon, the death of the Minotaur, the sacking of Troy… Bronze statues of Hermes alighted tables with period lamps. A bust of Jupiter rested at the bottom balustrade to the second floor. Rooms, and halls and corridors seemed to stretch forever, giving views of much more greater space. It was greater a place for any mortal man… it was a mansion crafted by godly hands with incredibly baroque furnishings and priceless artifacts seemingly hundreds of years old. Through this grand place were its hosts and guests garbed in mortal disguises… tuxedos, suits and expensive gowns. The women were beyond flawless… exceptionally beautiful with exquisite bodies and slender arms like Grecian statues brought to life. The men, most of them sporting intensely black beards and purely brown hair, were all tall and powerful in build as if they were bodybuilders touched by time, but no one had a semblance of silver hair. Not a white hair between any of them. Their features were granted character by slight aging in the form of beards and wrinkled faces, but there was not a single true aged man in the gathering. In their presence, Samantha felt unworthy… she felt as if she did not deserve to be here.

"This place is…." She could not think of the right word. "Oh my stars, I think I'm getting light-headed…"

"I'm sorry…" James supported her. "This place is a bit overwhelming at first. The house in Seattle isn't so bad."

"You have other homes…"

"Of course," Jason continued. "Almost everyone has their own individual casual residences, but we also have regular estates in England, Rome, Paris, Crete and St. Petersburg. I have a lot of relatives…."

"So, little brother…" James's older brother, Eros, had strided up to him in a tuxedo from a part in the guests. He was six feet tall with bold blue eyes, short blonde hair and the steely jaw of James Dean. "This is the current wife… the witch."

Samantha's eyebrows rose in surprise.

"How'd you know?" James asked.

"When was the last time anyone kept a secret in this family?" He looked over to his sister, Harmonia, with two of the Muses. They had been competing with each other to get the attention of Taran Jarrah, the mortal son of the Sumerian thunder-god, Ninurta, in attendance. His relationship with a Japanese sea goddess had fizzled out and Aphrodite had invited him to the gathering meet other prospective female Immortals. None of the Muses were married right now and neither were any of the seven Pleiades. It was going to be a very interesting party.

"Does anyone mind that I'm a witch?" Samantha asked as James handed her a glass of chardonnay.

"Are you kidding?" Eros looked distracted by the Russian love-goddess. "Aunt Hecate is so hysterically happy that she and Aunt Circe are finally talking to each other!" He excused himself and moved forward to switch to a Slavic tone to woo the goddess. Samantha turned toward her new husband with a curious quirk to her eyes.

"Aunt Hecate?"

"She's the daughter of Titans, just like grandfather…" James sipped his chardonnay and nudged her forward to meet his family and old friends. Amidst famous figures as Demeter and Persephone, Hercules and Balder, Ammon-Ra and Kwaku Ananse, there were the younger immortals… Cassandra Reason, Apollo's daughter by a Native American earth-goddess born during the Seven-Years War, Jerrold Odinson, the youngest son of Balder and Nanna of Asgard born during the Crusades, James's half-sisters, Sara, Jessica, Gwen, Alicia and Christina… the youngest among them born during the Salem witch hunts. The most stunning part of meeting these deities was discovering how they appeared in person. Anubis, the Egyptian-funeral deity was present as a guest of Hermes. He was seven feet tall and bald with the lean athletic figure of a sports star. Hermes himself had short reddish-blond hair and spouted one sarcastic line or comment after another as if he were a comedian holding his tongue. Zeus himself was tall and powerful with fiery red hair and a beard; his frame and size about to burst from his suit. No matter where he went… to converse with Ukko of the Finnish gods or lend his wisdom to his adult grandchildren, he was watched over by Hera, tall, brunette and Junoesque in her long French dress. If she did not keep an eye on him, he was apt to vanish upstairs with one of the female guests. For once let it be a party that did not end by storm, tornado, hurricane or some other natural disaster. No knowing how these parties usually ended, Samantha enjoyed meeting one of the Sirens and the grandson of Medusa. James' sisters asked if she was interested in having children by their brother and offered to bless the child the same way the Fates had in the past. According to Gwen, a few of the children the Fates had blessed in the past were MacBeth, Beowulf and the princess who served as inspiration for the tale of Sleeping Beauty.

"Samantha…" James returned to his new wife escorting his mother to meet her. "I want you to meet my mother…"

"Your mother…"

"Dearest, Samantha…." Aphrodite was so petite in person. Barely five feet and five inches tall, her long blonde hair hung down her back to the floor, and her dress left nothing to the imagination. It just barely concealed her female parts and made sure it revealed every voluptuous curve of her body. She had large open blue eyes and her doll-like features were very suggestive of every blonde Hollywood sex symbol from Marilyn Monroe to Betty Grable. "My baby boy says you have made him so happy. I like that very much!"

"It's a great honor to meet you, Lady Aphrodite…" Samantha could not help but curtsy.

"Darling, I have not been a goddess since…" The love-goddess effervescently shined with much joy and frivolity to be in her youngest son's presence with his wife. "When did Constantine become a Christian?" She asked her son.

"March 30, 313 AD." Jimmy answered. "Or as Aunt Athena calls it, the day the lights went out…."

Samantha lightly smiled but she didn't get the reference.

"The day the lights when out…" The love-goddess missed some of things with being worshipped, but posing as a famous heiress surrounded by celebrities and sports figures almost made her feel like a god again. "Yeah, that's what she called it, and yet, she didn't hesitate to lift a sword when it came to protect the Early Christian Church when father asked her."

"So, Christianity doesn't bother you?"

"Why should it?" Aphrodite never stopped shining with emotion as she talked. "Almost all of their holidays were originally pagan festivals. Do they bother you, Samantha… as a witch?"

"No, course not…." Samantha had even met St. Nicholas, the spirit now known as Santa Claus. "My family loves Christmas, but not as much as Halloween!"

Jimmy and his mother shared a smile of memories that had together.

"The truth of the matter, Samantha," Jimmy held her by the waist. "Almost every pantheon has their own name for the Hebrew Yahweh. We knew him as Eternity, my father's family called Gimle and the Egyptians called him Aton… Almost every appearance of angels in the Bible was actually members of my family carrying on work in his name. Some of us even attend regular Sunday congregations."

"Father respects Christianity very much…" Aphrodite was sipping wine from a glass. "I think it's because he's trying to make up for all those Early Christians the Romans slaughtered in our names."

Samantha opened her eyes wider to be learning all this facts. In one night, she was learning more about the heritage of the Immortals of Earth than about the sketchy beginnings of her family's origins. They both had much in common. They both were long-lived, they both had a propensity for magic and they both lived in a higher social hierarchy that mortal man. The only difference was that long before her ancestors were viziers, magicians and masters of sorcery to mortal kings, Jimmy's ancestors were teaching civilization and culture to mortal man and becoming the parents of the first ruling families of Earth. She raised her glass of chardonnay to sip through her ruby lips, but her eyes turned abruptly to notice one figure in particular. She was shorter than William's mother and posed of midnight black hair, all of it brushed backward from her white face into a dark mane of flowing dark hair. Her brown eyes were intense, her blood red lips and eyes the only true color in her face. Her body in a black bare shouldered long evening dress was young and petite with a bosom pressed upward by her every breath. Her name was Eris, but the Romans called her the goddess of strife. Homer called her Discord. Aristotle called her Enyo. She noticed Samantha immediately upon arriving the back way at her father's residence. One lingering look and she glided over to her brother, Ares, brooding and watching the room. Collar unbuttoned, tie hanging loosely, the former war-god trussed in mortal attire had sworn by the waters of the Styx to behave himself for the family's yearly gathering, but he did not need to like it.

"So, you have your godhood back…" Sister met brother.

"Yeah…." Ares mugged aggravatedly disgusted and annoyed with her. "With no thanks to you!" He reached up behind her and grabbed her long black hair, holding her in place from wandering away. "I ask for one little war between the Aztec and Voodoo gods and what do I get… arrows in my back, blow darts in my hair and an Aztec axe in my…."

"How long was it before you could sit down?"

"I'll let you know when it happens." Ares let go of her hair and ambled as if he had saddle sores to munch on deviled eggs and Bavarian sausages baked in tiny biscuits. "Because of Xena, I miss out on umpteen wars, including the best one of all of them, the so-called "War-to-end-all-wars," and because you can't keep your clothes on, I can't escalate Vietnam or Korea into anything bigger because father discovered you having sex with that Aztec nut."

"His name is Huitzilopochtli, and he thinks I'm more beautiful than Xochiquetzal." Discord beamed with dirty thoughts.

"Like I said… he's a nut!" Ares commented to tear down her personality then took another deviled egg and began eating it… his younger sister staring at him as he did so.

"I put one of my hairs in that egg you just ate." She commented.

Ares started coughing and choking on her vicious prank, rushing over to a potted plant and choking up anything that was in his throat. He turned round to glare at her, his eyes flared, teeth bared and eyebrow arched disgustedly arched. Over three thousand years and they were still getting on each other's nerves. Take away their godhood, immortality, vitality and mystical powers and they were just another brother and sister who hated each other but for no real reason to press each other's buttons.

"The second you're not looking…" Ares waved his finger in her face. "I'm giving you a pimple right where you'll never find it."

All his brunette brat of a sibling could do was narrow her eyes to warn him against trying. She pretended to be distracted, shifted her weight to her other leg and perused the room. Hermes and Anubis were talking to Oshun and Oya from Africa, the Incan deity Bachue was conversing with Quetzalcoatl under the portrait of Zeus painted by DaVinci and three of the Muses came through in almost perfect single file to head upstairs. Her eyes soon locked on her nephew Jason and his current mortal bride talking to his mother and their father. Father Zeus seemed enchanted by Samantha, taking her hand and kissing it to give his blessing to her union with her grandson. It seemed only a few decades ago that Discord was showing the young demigod how to start forest fires and pick fights, but then his mother shipped him off to Asgard and his father to get him out of her influence. The boy had become a man, and she was still more than interested in him.

"Is that the witch our nephew married?" She asked. Ares turned round with a glass of scotch.

"Yes…" He answered curtly before returning to standing surly in the corner. "But she's not a true mortal witch… she's a direct descendant of one of those practitioners Poseidon drove out of Atlantis… She has longevity, but she's not immortal." Ares downed the Scotch in one shot and rose his eyebrows piqued with interest. "Question is…." Ares popped a piece of calamari in his mouth. "What can we do to make their relationship even more interesting?"

"We could turn him into a woman…"

"I said interesting… not moronic…"

"We could introduce her to his third wife." Discord suggested. "She swore she'd return from the dead if he ever tried to marry again."

"Well, she didn't, did she?"

"We could turn her into a kid?"

Ares turned and looked at Discord. Just want stupid suggestion after another. He narrowed his eyes disgustedly at her.

"Tell me again why I let you hang around me?" He asked her.

"Because everyone else hates your guts." Discord confessed.

"Yes, I'm sure that's it…" Ares denied the truth and turned round as his nephew's wife and his sister finally met. Immortal beauty met mortal mystical beauty. The war god started shining with an idea.

"Why didn't I think of that?" He mumbled out loud. "Wait… I think I did."

"What?" Discord asked.

"We got a trip to make…" Ares turned out the back way without her, leaving the party to entertain itself. Aphrodite met her son's wife and loved her, hugging her and kissing her as another daughter. Cupid reacted a bit curious since she had never really warmly accepted his wife. Samantha was just a bit taller than the love goddess. The immortal diva bubbled with effervescent gaiety and good will and stood as if she were a younger sister to her own son.

"I'm so sorry I won't get to meet Jimmy's father." Samantha confessed.

"Those Viking-gods are unpredictable…." Aphrodite never stopped smiling except to sip her wine or pass a grape through her ruby lips. "They won't show up unless there's a fight to watch."

There was a sound of a skirmish from the hall to the ballroom. Jimmy and Samantha noticed it.

"Between gods… not sisters in a fight over a guy…" Aphrodite added.

"Mom, that's Sara and Jessica…"

"I know, honey…." Aphrodite ignored them to better appreciate meeting her new daughter-in-law. "But if I keep breaking them up, they're never going to learn their lesson, will they?!"


	4. Chapter 4

4

Not content to live anymore in secluded mountain top valleys or mystical kingdoms accessed by mysterious caves existing undergrounds, the majority of the gods from the Earth's past now existed alongside mortal environments usually in the lands of their worshippers and in a position akin to the roles they once played. Fukrokuju, the Japanese god of wisdom, was a computer analyst in Tokyo, Japan, but Poseidon lived on an island in the Caribbean, existing as the host of a very maritime and sea-themed resort open to mortal tourists. As Hades posed as a mortal demonologist in the field of paranormal research, Montu and Anhur, the Egyptian gods of war existed as phony gang members on the streets of Las Vegas, not far from where Ammon-Ra owned the Luxor Hotel and Casino. In Mexico, Quetzalcoatl was a Mexican government official for the descendants of his Aztec worshippers. He was often visited by Inti, the Incan sun-god posing as a Bolivian government agent busting drug shipments up and down the coast. Some of his informants were former Voodoo gods such as Oshun and Legba. Much of these gods from Greece to Africa, from Germany to India, had been living with their mortal descendants for hundreds of years, passing in and out of society to hide their immortality, sometimes passing as their own children and having innocuous roles in world history. Jimmy had been his own son, his own nephew and his own grandson, once briefly dating the great-granddaughter of his own mortal son from 1842. In current times, his home was an apartment off Park Avenue where his downstairs neighbors deduced he was a historian or an archaeologist. Now married with a beautiful mystical wife nearly as long-lived as himself, he no longer had a reason to live alone. Samantha woke happily married to find her husband setting breakfast up for her on his terrace. Faeries cleaned his home, spirits cooked his meals and falcons delivered his mail and messages. This was so far from any existence she had ever known.

"Jimmy, I wanted to make you dinner… mortal-style." She told him.

"I have others for that." Jimmy escorted her to her seat and pulled out her chair. Samantha sat down and looked upon eggs, fruits, pancakes, jams and jellies and other goodies. The centerpiece was a bowl of grapes, bananas, apples and other fruits. Around her, she saw the entire New York skyline from the terrace. She poured herself some coffee to start off.

"So…" Samantha beamed lovingly to him. "What do… Immortals do when they don't have to work?"

"We…" Jimmy spread jam on his toast before starting on his omelet. "Travel the world, observe what happens to others, watch over our descendants, try and keep humanity heading toward a greater future… We guide things along, but… we never get involved. We help, but we never do…"

"Give me an example." Samantha was intrigued.

"Well," Jimmy thought for a second. "I worked as a scout for General George Washington, sold supplies to Lewis and Clark, helped defend the Confederacy against the Union, pushed Lindbergh's plane through the mud, fought in both the World Wars, helped restore both Germany and Japan,…" He paused. "But to tell the truth…" Jimmy tried part of his omelet. "A lot of the time we're cleaning up each others messes."

"Such as…"

"The Great Chicago and Seattle Fires…" Jimmy turned a bit secretive. "There were Immortal causes behind those disasters." He rolled his eyes to make his point. "The Titanic, those five missing Avenger planes off Bermuda, the Mary Celeste… mortals in the wrong place at the wrong time when gods quarrel…"

"What's the worse thing you…"

"Let's not go there." Jimmy sipped his juice ready to eat his breakfast. "You'll be hearing about crop circles in a few more years…"

"Crop circles?"

"So I lose a few plesiosaurs from the past in Scotland." Jimmy continued eating. "They're happy. They're no longer extinct. They're not bothering anyone, and no one ever going to find them. At least I'm not the reason passenger pigeons are extinct…"

"Passenger pigeons…"

"Aunt Artemis keeps the last ones in her home in Minnesota…"

"Samantha!!!" Endora popped out of nowhere and scared Jimmy spewing his juice. She was excited. Hugging and kissing her daughter, she then turned to her new son-in-law. "My new son-in-law!!!" Endora was uncharacteristically excited. "So tall and handsome! Samantha…" She turned to her daughter. "I was upset when you said you had married, but a god, and not just any god but a grandson of Zeus!" She beamed excitedly. "I knew you were meant for big things, darling…"

"Mother, this is Jimmy. Jimmy, this is my mother." Samantha starting grinning happily. "I was with a party of his relatives, mother, and, oh… All the others I met there!"

"I know!" Endora turned to her daughter. "I tried to crash it, but…" She turned to Jimmy. "But I could not get through your grandfather's defenses. The entire property was enchanted against witch and warlock!"

"Grandpa has a big heart, but he loves his privacy, Mrs…"

Endora turned to him intrigued.

"You'd never be able to pronounce it." She beamed lovingly to him. "Just call me Endora,… son…"

Samantha never choked on her scrambled eggs. "Son?" She realized her mother's attitude to her marriage had changed.

"It's an honor to meet you, ma'am…" Jimmy took her hand and kissed it. Endora was enchanted. When she first thought her daughter had married a mortal, she was livid, ready to turn him into a mouse or a monkey, but upon hearing through the atmospheric continuum that he was a demigod, her heart and emotions swelled with pride and honor. Her daughter… married to a being even greater than her own lineage.

"Oh, I have many questions for you, young man..." Endora took a seat by her daughter as James looked from his mother-in-law then to his wife. "First off, my daughter is used to a certain lifestyle with servants…"

"That's pretty much covered." Jimmy responded. Samantha was lightly chuckling with a big grin across her face as she had her breakfast.

"Another thing… grandchildren…" Endora enquired and Samantha started choking with a light cough over her omelet.

"Mother!!!"

"Darling, you are going to have visitors…" Endora had even stunned and embarrassed Jimmy. "Go check the door and let your mother and husband talk."

"Mother, don't embarrass me!" Samantha heard the doorbell to the apartment ringing after her mother had predicted it. The blonde sorceress looked from her mother to her husband and back again. She then turned suspiciously from the terrace and into the apartment living room, hastening paste the fireplace to the entry way and opened the left side of the double door to one of the couples from the floor. The wife was short and stout with large brown eyes; the husband was taller and leaning with a thinning hairline, dressed in a casual sweater and light blue sweater with a pipe in his hand.

"Hi," The wife responded. "I'm Grady Kravitz and this is my husband, Abner!"

"How do you do?" Samantha was adjusting her robe to meet neighbors in the hallway.

"Hi, how you doing?" The coddled husband responded a bit laid back. "You're right, Gladys. Jason's wife is a major hottie."

"Yes, that's right." The wife wasn't that perturbed over her husband distracted by Samantha's looks. "We just wanted to meet you and say hello with this…" She handed Samantha a pie. "It's apple crumbly, a Kravitz family recipe. We just had to welcome you to the building!"

"Well, thank you!" Samantha was honored.

"I'm so glad that Jason finally married." Gladys continued. "I was so getting worried about him. It's not right for a man to stay single. You know, people talk. I once tried to fix him up with my niece…"

"Hey, do you ever do any exercising in a leotard and shorts?" Abner reacted a bit distracted. Gladys reacted shocked. "I mean if you do, Jason's balcony is in full view of our place and a great place to exercise. We have a stewardess on the other side who sunbathes, and she has like the biggest set of…"

"Abner!!!" Gladys was screaming. Samantha was reacting confusingly reserved.

"Coming, Gladys…" Abner turned away. "I got to go." He turned away fully entrenched in the role of the retired husband completely possessed by the shrill overbearing wife. Gladys welcomed Samantha to the building once more and cheerfully grinned as she dealt with her voyeuristic husband, pushing him away from Jimmy's apartment before she kicked him down the elevator shaft. Samantha just reacted a bit overwhelmed and flustered by meeting them. She carried the pie across the apartment to the dining area, placing the pie to the table and breaking off a piece of crust to taste. It tasted sweet with an extra taste of cinnamon, bananas and something else. She paused and realized something else. Gladys had called Jimmy "Jason." How did they know his real name?

"Sam!!!!" Jimmy was calling her. Samantha looked up and realized her father had come to meet her husband. As if being confronted by both his in-laws wasn't bad enough, but he had to mediate the futures and names of children who had not been born yet.

"Maurice is a great name for a boy." The Shakespearean warlock argued.

"Why would we name little Endora "Maurice?" His ex-wife clashed with him.

"Sam?" Jimmy was at his wits end and resisting a compulsion to blast them both with lightning bolts.

"Daddy… Mother, stop it!" Samantha raced toward her bickering parents. "We haven't even discussed children yet!"

Out in the hallway from the apartment, the Kravitz were stalling and loitering in the sitting area of the elevators. Her figure suddenly became shapely. He was developing the stamina and physique of a younger man. Gladys' short hair was letting go to longer dark hair and an attire of bondage including belts and straps for a more bustier figure. Abner's hair had grown out, losing his polyester and cardigan look for leather and buckskin. Another second more and Ares and Discord had regained their true forms. They peered back to their nephew's apartment with hidden agendas embroidered in mischief. Discord's red lips grinned devilishly just before she smacked her brother across the chest.

"Leotard?!" She chided him. "Stewardess?!!"

"I was selling the role." The war-god mused a bit. "I had to be sure she bought it." Discord just rolled his eyes wondering why she hung around him.

"As soon as she has some, I'll slip in and remove the pie before Jason finds it." She continued talking. "We can't run the risk of him discovering it."

"How much does she have to eat?" Ares asked.

"Just one slice…." Discord reported. "And she'll become just like Jason and us…. A true immortal…."

"And considering her inherent witchcraft…." Ares liked what happened next.

"It will drive her crazy… if she survives the experience…." They began grinning mischievously, suppressed laughs held between them before they vanished together for the realms between mortal worlds.


	5. Chapter 5

5

After breakfast, Jimmy wanted to do whatever Samantha wanted to do. Be it witchly or mortal. She chose the female thing to do; she wanted to peruse the shops along the street to look at the new styles and dresses coming out whether she wanted to buy something or not. Jimmy wanted to buy her anything she wanted, but she just smiled toward him. He loved her. He would have bought her anything she wanted. If she wanted a palace in France, he would have found a way to get it for her. Her followed her like a little boy from the dress shop to another and then a furniture store where they debated buying a house, but Samantha liked the apartment. She didn't want more than that. Along their day, little things began happening… all the animals in the pet store suddenly became distracted by Samantha. They all loved her, including the seeing-eye dog that lead the blind man along. After that interesting encounter, it was for a walk through the park and toward the business district with one after another parking meter exploding as they passed them, each of them erupting almost fifty dollars in dimes, quarts and nickels. Jimmy and Samantha looked back as people watched the meters and grabbed up the free cash and free parking. Just another weird encounter they shrugged off. It was almost as if the witch and demigod side by side exuded a presence of good luck around them. A taxicab suddenly lurched and stuck to a spot as they rushed to catch it, not a single red light came up as they headed for Times Square, the smell in the taxi cab turned to jasmine and on arrival at their restaurant, a homeless person begging for cash suddenly tore off his glasses and realized he could see. Jimmy and Samantha watched him running down the street hysterically happy. They looked at each other wondering if they were at the cause of all the good luck. When Samantha asked for baked fish for lunch, the maitre'd told them that he was out of it. A few minutes later, he asked if she was still interested because several dozen fish were suddenly flooded out of their cooler!

From there, the occurrences became more surreal, paranormal and more disturbing. During lunch, young men were suddenly noticing her much more as if her female attraction had been amplified. Even a little crying baby in a carrier stopped crying and started cooing to the surprise of his mother. From there, Jimmy and Samantha visited a few more stores. The entire time, all the mannequins turned toward Samantha's presence to acknowledge her, and when they crossed that way again, they were suddenly all blonde and resembled her! It was right there that Jimmy suspected it might not be them but just Samantha. His suspicion was confirmed when they hailed a taxi and the back passenger door came off in Samantha's hand, spooking the cab driver so badly that he drove away at top speed. When the subway stalled, Samantha casually asked how long it would be for the power to return and the power came on, skipped two stops and took them to their stop. Everyone departed that subway right there calling it "haunted," but then it broke down again and didn't move for three hours. And then there were the voices… Samantha was suddenly hearing the thoughts of everyone and anyone. It started in the restaurant of twenty people, she was hearing the voices of more than a hundred, probably more than a thousand, thinking, planning, conspiring, plotting… It became really bad in the subway where she had to cover her ears from the voices in her head. Jimmy then rushed her home to deal with her headache of voices and conversations from across the city.

"Samantha, what's going on?" He guided her in to the apartment.

"I don't know!" She held on to the wooden staircase to their bedroom as leaves and branches started bursting from the processed and stained wood fixture, bringing it to life and forcing it to burst with flowers, leaves and branches. She jumped back from the phenomenon. Even when she stopped touching it, it continued growing a few seconds more, turning into a bush in the shape of the staircase banister.

"Is this a new spell?"

"Jimmy, I'm not doing this!" Samantha swore to him. "Witch's honor!" She gave him her word with the witch's gesture of honesty, her two fingers placed to her face as a solemn vow.

"Did you eat anything weird?" He watched her holding her hands over her ears to try and block out the voices. She walked forward into the apartment, the skies outside over the city getting darker as the weather reacted to her pain and discomfort.

"No, I had toast, eggs, bacon, juice and blueberries just like you this morning." She reached to him once again wanting his support, but as she turned to him, she was easily taller than him by two inches and she noticed it too. Whatever was affecting her was having an even bigger effect on her physical appearance!

"Did you shrink?" She asked.

"Samantha, this isn't good." Jimmy was looking at her up and down. Her skirt was now a miniskirt and her sweater was turning into a t-shirt as her body continued to develop and become much more voluptuous. She looked as if she were smuggling honeydew melons on her person!

"Jimmy!!!" Her eyes rounded in terrified shock, she started losing it "What's happening to me?!!!"

"Samantha…" He approached her and held her by her arms to look at him. "You are losing control over your witchcraft! Think! Did you eat, drink, touch anything this morning or at the party last night?!"

"Jimmy, we've eaten the same things since we got married." She looked at him. "How do I know where your food comes from?!" She looked at her body and felt violated. In the mirror, she even looked younger. It was as if she had turned back to her teenage years and took another road to adulthood, one more bosomy and obvious!

"Samantha, I don't like what you're implying." Jimmy turned worried and confused. "It comes from the market. It's not made or cooked any different than any other mortal cuisine. None of my other wives ever…"

"Jimmy…" Samantha had a revelation. She recalled the Kravitz couple. "Jimmy, I had a slice of pie while you were in the shower! Your neighbors, the Kravitz, they brought it over!"

"Neighbors?" Jimmy tuned confused after looking out to the terrace. "I don't have any neighbors. My sisters rent the other apartments on this floor!" He turned through the swinging door to his kitchen and looked around and in his icebox for the pie. He looked around once and over looking for the incriminating pie and headed back to Samantha staring in disbelief at her flawless reflection in the mirror and her tight sweater. "Samantha, think! Were they golden apples?"

"They were baked in a pie! I didn't notice!"

"By Odin's beard!" Jimmy realized the truth. "Samantha, I think one of my relatives slipped you golden apples! They're baked into ambrosia! Olympian wine is distilled from them. Samantha, they provide the youth and immortality of the gods!"

"I'm becoming immortal?!"

"I don't think your witchcraft likes it either!" Jimmy looked at her unsure what to do. "It's like… you've been switched a flashlight battery for a nuclear battery. Your power level is going to keep going up and up and up…"

"Doctor Bombay, come right away!!!" The frightened blonde witch called for her family witch doctor. Unprepared by the strong-armed magic, the poor doctor was lurched from his English home and toward the New York City apartment. There was no trying to ignore her. He was there one minute and gone the next. He appeared in her presence with a bolt of lightning, abducted by powerful magicks that left him just a bit overwhelmed and disoriented.

"Cobblestones and copper pots, Samantha!!!" He staggered on his feet. "Where did you get such a powerful…" He turned to face her and looked her over up and down from her centerfold figure, her longer blonde hair and to her incredible long legs. "Well, you're looking very… healthy!" He turned to Jimmy. "I get the feeling you had something to do with this?"

Jimmy just folded his arms disgusted and shot the good witchdoctor a nasty look.

"Doctor Bombay," Samantha turned from the mirror. "I accidentally ate some apples from the Garden of the Hesperides!" She got it right; she knew the tales from mythology. "I'm turning into a god! You've got to stop it!"

"I don't have that capability!" He couldn't stop looking at her new figure. "My lord, Samantha! I treat witches, not immortals… This is beyond my power!" He smirked with a twitch of his mustache. "Look at it like this, you might be better off as an Immortal. You'd no long fall under any of those nasty spells and hexes that mortal wizards and sorcerers let loose after us."

"Dr. Bombay!!!"

"You better be careful." Jimmy spoke to Bombay. "She could turn you into a fly and feed you to a pigeon."

"Right-O!!!" Bombay understood that warning. "Samantha, sit here, left elbow up, deep breath…" He took out a tuning fork, tapped it against her elbow and was distracted by her chest taking the breath. "She sure gets a lot of air in there, doesn't she?" He looked to Jimmy with a dirty grin.

"Doctor!!!"

"Yes…" Bombay turned professional again. "Spells and hexes, power of nightshade and wolfsbane, free this witch of all her mortal pain, restore herself, right as reign…" A burst of lightning off Samantha tossed him across the living room, off the fireplace mantle and dropped him to the floor. His wife jumping to her feet after realizing what she had done, Jimmy hastened over to the doctor and started lifting him up to his feet.

"Sixth floor - belts, sashes, shoes, boots and old coots…" Bombay mumbled out of it and collapsed again on to the sofa.

"Jimmy!!!" Samantha looked to him then her husband. "Don't you have a doctor or something?"

"Yeah, my cousin, Asclepius…" He wondered why he hadn't thought of him further. "Last I heard, he was doing relief work in Ethiopia… but Imhotep is much closer. He's a doctor in Chicago…" Samantha's parents suddenly appeared in bursts of light with her cousin Serena. Just a minor thought on how she was going to tell her family, and Samantha had unwittingly commanded them to her presence with her growing godhood. She had plucked them out of conversations, social gatherings and other worldly parties. Just a minute ago, Serena was wooing several beaus and now she was in a Park Avenue apartment in New York City.

"Sammy," She screeched with that annoying voice. "I was dating!"

"Samantha, you snatched me out of a meeting with…" Endora came closer to her daughter. "Why do you look different?"

"Mother," Samantha didn't know how to say it. She looked from Jimmy to her mother. "I'm becoming immortal." She tensed up from the explosion. She feared her parents' wrath on her husband.

"James, my boy!!!" Maurice was bursting with pride. "You made my daughter a god like yourself!!! I couldn't be more proud of a son-in-law who…."

"Daddy!!!" Samantha screeched as the New York sky reacted with her temper and cracked with lightning.

"Imagine the looks of our friends when I tell them Samantha is immortal!" Endora was ecstatic. "The Contessa will be so green…"

"Mother!!!"

"Folks, look…" Jimmy took charge. "Samantha doesn't want this. She wants control over her witchcraft again."

"If she doesn't want it…" Wearing a slinky black-feather dress, Serena came up alongside Jimmy and noticed how much her blonde cousin had developed. "Can I have it?"

"Hecate help us all…" Endora did not want her flighty niece in control of that much power. The girl was the daughter of Maurice's sister, Enchantra, but she was not exactly all there.

"Not going to happen…" Bombay shook the delirium and confusion out of his head and stood back up. "Samantha's witchcraft and sudden immortality are incompatible. Literally speaking, Samantha is having a mystical conniption fit trying to control energies beyond her control!" Bombay realized. "Forgive the blasphemy, but witches are incapable of commanding that much magic!"

"Oh my stars…" Samantha looked at her hands. There were volts of electricity jumping from her fingers like small flashes of light dancing from fingertips. Two to three sparks at a time jumped from one finger to another in separate directions from her middle finger to her thumb, from her index finger to her finger and when her hands were too close, they both started cracking with balls of tingling static force waiting to become lightning bolts. It was a lot of power. She almost liked it, but when she lifted her eyes to Jimmy, they were full of tears…

"Jimmy…" She reached to him out of love and he exploded from her embrace, getting tossed across the room and bouncing off the wall with smoke from his clothing. Serena watched him leave a hole in the wall as he hit the floor.

"Dr. Bombay!" Endora narrowed her eyes to him. "You're a doctor, do something!"

"I am…" Bombay looked at her with worry and fear. "I'm doing what the Clantons should have done and getting the hell out of Dodge!" He gestured to teleport once, twice, three times and realizing he was not re-materializing anywhere else. "Confound you, Samantha, you're still grounding me here! You and your crazy godhood!"

"Dr. Bombay…." Maurice looked at Samantha wandering back and forth unsure what to do. "You're our family witch doctor. Tear some of those energies from our daughter and restore her to normal this instance or else I'll ruin your reputation across the cosmos!"

Bombay looked to Samantha on the floor wanting to help Jimmy but scared of touching him. She was crying emotionally distraught over so many things. Her powers were out of control, her husband was out cold on the floor and her body had been replaced by a six-foot-tall Playboy Playmate centerfold. Serena dropped down next to her as a brunette example of what her size and shape used to be.

"Sammy, does he have a twin brother?" She asked.

"My good, man…" Bombay stood face to face with Maurice. "I do not respond to blackmail…"

"I'll tell your wife you've been fooling around with your nurses…" Endora tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention.

"Threats, however, are something different…." Bombay was however afraid of Endora. He shooed Serena away from her six-foot-tall cousin on the floor and Samantha looked up to him distraught, distressed and terrified as her own powers turned against her. Her own mind was reaching levels of enlightenment she had never experienced. Her once blue eyes were completely white and glowing and when she looked up, she saw levels and planes of existence around her. She could see through the world. Ghosts and spirits all around her, a universe teaming with life, people upstairs and downstairs in the beginning around her, the lives of millions around her for over hundred miles… her consciousness was tapping the life force of the universe.

"Young witch blonde and fair…." Bombay chanted over her. "Once a mortal from your feet to your hair… Shed this form which has bewitched you, become your true self, I beseech you!"

Samantha's body once again exploded as protection against the incantation tried on her. Everything turned a blinding white light and her family members were hurled around her beyond her control. When she looked down, she realized she wasn't touching the floor. She was levitating off the floor. Rings of power were cracking across her body up her legs and down her arms. Her breath rushing, her heart pounding with the fury of a thunderstorm, she looked to her parents at her feet then over to her husband groaning in pain. She had actually hurt him!

"You know… I don't think that did it…" Bombay tried lifting his head.

"Really, what was your first sign?" Serena rose after landing on her chest.

"Samantha!!!"

Levitated a foot off the floor, she had become pure light. Her long tresses of hair waving from the beats of energy flowing through her, she lifted her ands up to see them. They were perfect white, illuminating in the darkness of the cloudy and stormy sky covering the city. A pulse of lighting crackled from her heart and pulsed from her fingers. The voices in her head were not as bad, but she felt almost at peace… When she looked upon her family and doctor, she felt as if she knew them, but not quite… She was an Immortal without worshippers, energy trapped in a physical form, a force of nature that could do anything it wanted… All the power pouring through her, her body tingling with energies, she felt unstoppable… she could do anything! Extreme power was hers if she could contain it.

"Samantha…" Prostrate on the floor, Maurice looked at his daughter. Her unearthly white face was glowing from within, her hair pouring out from her head as undulating waves of forces resonating from the explosions of magic within her. She held her hands up to see them. They were white to bright yellow in color, surrounded in dull yellow light permeating off her skin. Within the light were flickers of electricity crackling off of her in short and quick bursts. Reaching to her face, she looked at her reflection in the picture frame over the fireplace. She had no features, no discernible eyes and her long blonde hair was little more than an aura of flame around her body.

"Jimmy…" She was reaching to her husband. Her voice had no reverb to it. It sounded like an echo from her ethereal lungs. "Jimmy… What's happened to me?" He was still out cold from the blast he took from her. She looked to her doctor and family. They looked scared to death of her.

"No!" She screeched an unearthly shriek and struck her arm skyward… exploding into nothing but energy collapsing into a pinhole of light that blinked out as fast as she vanished.


	6. Chapter 6

6

Black t-shirt, dark sunglasses and blue jeans, Marshall Reason, formerly Ares, the god of war, carried a can of beer out to the backyard veranda of the family home near Olympia, Washington. His sister, Eris Discordia Reason, former goddess of strife and mischief, was clad in a black bathing suit and laying stretched out in a patio chair trying to tan. It was a bright sunny day. Hermes was frying an egg on the concrete, Calypso and Thetis were enjoying the swimming pool with two of the Muses and Daphne and Nyyrikki came from their stroll through the local woods from collecting seeds and acorns. Ares looked at his sister with her pale unfreckled white skin and wondered why she never tanned. She looked as if she was a goddess of the underworld; a shorter bustier version of Eriskegal or a brunette version of Tuonetar. A sip of the mortal ale in his hand and he tipped the can over her, a long drop of the cold air pouring through her cleavage and making her jump from the chair.

"Keep it in the can!!!" She tried pushing him into the pool.

"Awwww…" Calming drinking his beer, he was amused by her strained pushing and shoving. "Is that the best you can do… can't even knock me over…"

"Wait…" Discord stopped and stepped back pulling hair long dark locks back. "Did you feel a breeze?" She felt a cold chill. It was sunny and warm, but the wind suddenly gusted from the south and tossed the treetops. The bright blue sky was turning gray as clouds washed over the area and blocked out the sun. His face furrowed out of confusion, Ares looked toward the meadow then toward the stables. Something did not feel right. If there was a feeling of apprehension for gods, this was it. It felt as if he was boxed in from all sides with no way out… even while standing in the open patio. Discord looked round in her bathing suit.

"It feels as if one of the Titans have been freed…" She looked up and around the estate. Euterpe and Melpomene dashed from the poolside to head inside. The sky cracked with thunder and more clouds were rolling in as Ploutus and Calypso hastened round to the side entrance from the garden. Ares looked round one more time sneering and furling and unfurling his left hand as he anticipated an attack.

"Someone's just become a god…" He remarked as lightning cracked. It struck him to the chest and propelled him off the patio with a hard crash. Discord veered round with spheres of energy from her hands. Clad in green robes and gold armor, Samantha repelled one on her silver staff and came running. She had mastered her godly powers. She turned her staff into a vaulting pole and propelled herself up on to the pool area, landing a few feet from the conniving goddess. Discord pelted her with balls of force and Samantha conjured lightning bolts powerful enough to knock down Thor. The wily goddess clenched her teeth to teach the newfound immortal a few tricks, blasting her opponent's weapon to melt into drops of liquid steel. Angry and violated, Samantha gestured at the patio furniture, flinging them to the goddess of mischief who blasted them into their singular parts. Ares leapt up to contend with her as well. He fired lightning bolt after lightning bolt after Samantha as Discord raced around the pool for cover, but Samantha blasted the foundation under her and dropped her concrete and bricks into the pool. Turning to the war-god, her five feet of blonde hair waved and swung from her head as she avoided his blasts. All the time, she was generating her own blast and fired it from both her hands at once, knocking the war-god off his feet, through the window of the parlor, across the kitchen and fifteen feet through the house to the staircase to the game room where he tumbled, rolled and fell had over heels into his father's presence. Trying to finally read a bit of Hemingway, the thunder god took his cup of tea off the serving table seconds before his son crashed through it, ht the wall to loosen and get hit by the mounted heard of the Erymanthian Boar.

"What did you do this time?" Father looked to son.

"What? This is my fault?!"

Gasping upon realizing what she had done, Samantha looked at her hands stunned. She had just bested not one but two powerful gods, two former deities older than her husband. This power, her body, her… senses…. She could feel and sense everything. The birds around her building nests, the wing singing as it whipped her hair, the sun's rays permeating her powerful stamina, she felt it all. The birds flew around her and seemingly cheered her. The clouds parted with her gaiety. All of creation was at her command… Her senses told her where everything was around her but the gods themselves. Ares was beyond her senses, but Discord had eluded her. As she searched out her enemies, she heard something else. Her now godly senses were tingling to warn her of a shadow of power close to her. She spun round ready to strike, the palm of her hand landing straight on the mallet head of a Norse hammer. Beneath that horned Viking helmet, two familiar brown eyes looked back upon her.

"Samantha…" Jimmy had shed his mortal guise and became Jason Donner Odinson once more. Seven feet tall with long dark hair and a full beard, he was clad in Viking battle armor and wielding Thunderstriker, a near duplicate of his father's hammer, Mjolnir. He befitted more a character from a realm of fantasy. He walked in leather sandals shielded by gold adamantine from Olympus and carried a sword and bow and arrow on his back from Asgard. He was the son of the Greek and German gods… of the Roman and Norse gods… Samantha released her emotions and the sun started shining again as she held her husband. Their hearts beat together in love…

"Jimmy…" She tried to catch her breath. "I can't believe what I did! I… I… I just fought two gods!!!"

"I know…" He removed his helmet and guided her off the back steps for a walk through the woods on the property. "I was so worried about you. You know, sometimes mortals can't handle godhood and it corrupts them. Hercules, Dionysus, Helen, Osiris, Gilgamesh… They were all mortal at first or gods who were raised mortal, and sometimes… they lose what humanity that had when they are given a taste of power."

"Jimmy…" Samantha hesitated on the path near a bush bursting with flowers for her. "I don't want this. Your cousin, Asclepius… He can change me back, right."

"Samantha," Jimmy was oddly hesitant. "Godhood… isn't that far different than witchcraft except…" He led her by the hand. "You don't need incantations, spells or invocations. Your soul, your life force… you're linked with the universe and everything in it from the weather, the earth and everything on it. Anything you want… if your mind can create it, you can summon it."

"Jimmy," Samantha looked to him. "I don't want this. These…" She looked down upon her robes and armor and chain mail. "…aren't my clothes. This isn't even my body! I liked being a witch."

"But…" Jimmy looked at her. "As a god, we could be together forever. We could live side by side and have many children… We would know their children and their children…"

"I had that as a witch…" Samantha tried to convince him. "Jimmy, I know this means a lot to you, but… I'd never ask you to be something you weren't. Don't make me something I'm not."

"You have all you had as a witch… " He implored her. "And a lot more…"

"A lot more!" Samantha gestured to her height and stamina. "Jimmy, please don't ask me to stay like this. You didn't see how terrified my mother and father were of me."

"Samantha…" Her caressed her face between her cheek and her mane of hair. "I couldn't turn you back even if I wanted to..."

They heard another noise. Down on the bank of the duck pond, someone had skipped a rock across the water's surface. They noticed someone with red curly hair and a beard wearing blue jeans, boots and a dark shirt with a light jacket. His long hair trussed into a small ponytail only two inches long, the former Titan-killer looked up smugly and enigmatically.

"I recall having almost the exact same conversation with Perseus several… several generations ago." Zeus spoke. "After he established peace with Thessaly and Thrace, the Fates told me that his life was nearing its end, and I offered him a chance to be a god alongside his siblings. Unlike the rest,…" He skipped another stone. "He said he would much rather go down in history as a great man than as a god with greatness thrust upon him." The wise thunder-god god revealed he was meant for so much more. He had much wisdom over just tossing thunderbolts and charming young females.

"Grandfather," Jimmy turned to him. "I love her. Please convince her not to give this up…"

"I'll do no such thing." He responded grandfatherly to his grandson and stood between the two of them with his hands on their shoulders. "Samantha…" He turned to her. "Would you love Jimmy if he were a warlock or a mortal? Would you place his happiness before your own?"

"Yes." She lightly gasped.

"Jimmy, would you do the same for Samantha and give up your godhood for her? Would you live as a mortal for her?"

"What?" Jimmy looked to him and back to Samantha. "Yes… yes, of course!"

"Then…" The Olympian patriarch emanated glowing energy from his hands he churned in the air. "I peel back the pages of time, back to when you met, back to when destiny placed you together…" The churning light expanded into clouds rising off the lake, a foggy surface that immersed the young couple and surrounded their senses. What was once sunny was a sky of gray and smoky mist.

"I return your spirits to your former selves." Zeus's voice came from the thick smoke he had churned. "Jason, you are a mere demigod in mortal attire. Samantha, a remarkable sorceress with the blood of your ancestors… What has conspired has not happened and you are free to relive your love once more…."

It was September 23, 1963 once again and Samantha was a young beautiful woman… not as voluptuously or endowed as she was but still a beautiful woman. She was outside the Clark Building on Thirty-Fourth Street, and she had her body back. She was garbed in a familiar white dress and looking around for Jimmy. She looked around once along the street and past the dispersing smoke and then to the revolving doors of the office building. Thinking he was inside, she rushed to join him, bumping into another man in the doorway.

"Excuse me…" They shared brief eye contact. A brief look, an apologetic gasp, she paced forward a few feet and looked round. He wasn't here either.

"Jimmy?" She looked round. There were people coming and going, entering the elevator and ascending the stairs to the top landing. Disconcernly looking around, she reacted confused, bewildered… where was he?

"Excuse me, ma'am?" The gentleman she had bumped into her spoke softly to her. "Are you okay? It looks as if you were looking for someone?"

"I am…" Samantha reacted alarmed. "I'm looking for…." She hesitated as her memories adjusted from the passage in time. "I'm looking…" She looked at her hand, but for what reason? She wasn't married. She wasn't even seeing anyone.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Her host looked concernly over her. "You know, I work upstairs for McMann And Tate. I'm Darren Stephens; I'm in advertising. I know everyone in the building. Is there someone I can get for you?"

"I don't know…" Samantha confessed. "But… thank you very much, Mr. Stephens."

"I hope you find whoever you're looking for." He smiled to her compassionately and turned with a strong hold on his briefcase to the elevator. Looking back, he noticed Samantha looking round again then hastening out of the building alone. Confused, alone, why did she feel she had lost something? What did she lose? And why was she looking at her left hand? Upstairs on the second floor landing, Jimmy Reason felt her heart breaking to be doing this to her.

"I lied…" He gasped. "I wouldn't have given up my immortality for her. I mean…" He shrunk back ashamed from view. "I love her, but… I much would rather have her immortal by my side than any other way." His eyes filled with emotion. "I married her as a mortal girl, I loved her as a witch and I thought she'd be more happy as a god, but… I can't make the same commitment for her."

"I figured as much." His grandfather looked over the top landing and out the window to the outside sidewalk. Samantha paced round confused one more time then gave up and continued on her way.

"I love you, Samantha…" Jimmy's voice quaked with emotion. "But you're better off with someone who will love you as you are…"

Twilight Zone voice-over: "Romeo and Juliet, Act Five, Scene Three, Go hence to have more talk of these sad things; some shall be pardoned, and some punished. For never was a story of more woe than this of Juliet and her Romeo. End scene… If you truly love something, let it go. Lesson learned… in The Twilight Zone."

END


End file.
